Intervention sees TF1 return to FTA satellite

Following intervention by French broadcasting watchdog the Conseil supérieur de l’audiovisuel (CSA) and the country’s Culture Minister, Canal+ reinstated during the course of the evening of Wednesday March 8th, its retransmission of free-to-air service TF1 which had been interrupted since the evening of Thursday March 1st following a carriage dispute between the pair.

The reinstatement covers all satellite offers, some 1.5 million subscribers on TNT Sat and 2.2 million who subscribe solely to satellite, out of 5.5 million households, with OTT boxes not being included.

A Statement issued by Canal+ early on the evening of March 7th said that following the request of the CSA, and the statement Culture Minister Françoise Nyssen, who had specified that programmes from free-to-air channels must be free for viewers served by satellite, the group would be restoring the signal during the evening.

Nyssen had, in effect, called on the Canal+ Group to restore the broadcast of TF1 on TNT Sat for viewers who had no access to France’s DTT platform.

“It’s good news, I’m proud of this sensible decision which will allow viewers who rely on satellite distribution to be able to receive TF1,” she declared.

Nicolas Curien, acting president of the CSA, was delighted by the decision. “Tonight, the problem will be fixed, he asserted in an interview with BFM-TV. “We’ve met with both parties and have received this voluntary and spontaneous undertaking from Canal.”

The restoration of the signal follows reports that the dispute had seen TF1 lose 12 per cent of its average audience.